


making up for lost time

by kira_katrine



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Family, Gen, Post-Season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-22
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:01:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23253631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kira_katrine/pseuds/kira_katrine
Summary: Separated from the Discovery crew, Michael finds she doesn't have to be alone.Written for the All the Nice Things Flash Exchange.
Relationships: Gabrielle Burnham & Michael Burnham
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8
Collections: All The Nice Things Flash Exchange 2020





	making up for lost time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LittleRaven](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleRaven/gifts).



She was standing several feet away, looking out into the distance. Michael recognized her immediately, even though she had only seen her once in twenty-three years. _Of course I would. That woman is my mother, after all._

Michael stood still, not sure what to do. She wanted to run over to her mother, hug her, have her tell her things would be all right, that they’d get through it. But she wasn’t sure that’s what she would get, wasn’t sure if her mom as she’d known her was even really still there. Not sure if this woman even wanted her around, or if she thought Michael would just get in the way of--

But before Michael could even begin thinking about pulling herself out of these thoughts, Gabrielle Burnham was running toward her, pulling Michael into a hug. Whispering, “Oh, Michael… oh, my darling baby girl, I was afraid I’d never see you again.”

Gabrielle stepped back and looked at Michael, hands on Michael’s shoulders. “I never wanted this for you,” she whispered, a mix of relief and pain in her eyes.

“Well, I’m here now,” said Michael. “I said I’d find you again, and I’m here.”

“I was supposed to come home to you,” her mom said. “I was supposed to fix your world--”

“And when I was a child, you could,” said Michael. “Back then, you and Dad always could. But I’m not a kid anymore.”

“I knew something must have happened,” said her mom. “I knew that somehow, the timeline must have changed. I didn’t know how. I thought maybe you and your shipmates had somehow figured out a way to stop Control from the twenty-third century… but I never thought--I never thought for a moment you’d show up here.”

“As far as I can tell, it really is gone,” said Michael. “Whatever’s happened here, it wasn’t Control’s doing.”

“So what you did really worked,” her mother said. “I was already so incredibly proud of you when I saw you on the Discovery--when I saw you before on the Shenzhou, and before that on Vulcan, and before that, I’ve always known you were amazing, but this… you’re a more incredible woman than I could possibly imagine.”

“What we did worked,” Michael said, and she didn’t just mean herself and her mother--she meant the whole Discovery crew, all those people who had helped create the suit, who had decided to follow her into this unknown future, who might have all given up their lives for this mission.

“Come on, Michael,” said her mother. “Come home with me.”

It was strange to actually be standing inside the place where her mom had recorded all those logs, the ones she’d watched over and over supposedly to figure out what had happened in that once-distant future and how to recreate and use the timesuit in the present. That had, of course, been part of it. But Michael had also wanted to know her mother, the woman she hadn’t seen in so many years, who she’d believed to be dead for as long. The woman she’d never truly stopped missing no matter how much time went by, how much Vulcan discipline Michael practiced.

“This is where I’ve been living,” Michael’s mother said. 

“I know,” said Michael.

“It’s not much, but it’s what I could put together out here.”

“It’s great,” Michael said. She herself had spent months living out of a shelter even smaller than this, back on the planet where she’d crash-landed after her jump through time. She’d been alone almost all of that time, and had almost convinced herself that was fine, perhaps even how she preferred it, that all that mattered was to figure out what was going on in this world and how to fix it. She’d wondered if that was how her mother had felt, during all her time in the angel suit.

“I do want to get off of this planet,” said her mother. “And I’m guessing you do too, at some point. You’re not going to be any happier just watching this all happen than I would be. But it doesn’t have to be now. You can stay here a little while.”

“I can?” This wasn’t really what Michael had expected either. When her mother had appeared on Essof IV all that time ago, she’d had neither time for nor interest in anything but her mission.

“Of course,” her mother said. She seemed to notice the surprised look on Michael’s face. “The immediate threat to the galaxy seems to have been dealt with. We’re not going to fix everything that’s happened since in a day, Michael. It’s going to be a process, a long one, one I’ve had months to think about since the timeline changed. It’s going to be much too long to never do anything but that. You already saved all of sentient life, baby girl. You can take a bit of time to rest at Mom’s house.”

Michael still wasn’t sure. She didn’t know if she even knew how to do that anymore. 

“I couldn’t have done it without you,” she said.

“You should never have had to,” her mother whispered. “But there’s nothing that can be done about that now.” She reached over and squeezed Michael’s hand. “All either of us can do is move forward into what’s ahead. And what I want to do now is take care of you. Think of it as making up for lost time.”

Michael nodded. She _did_ want that too. Both of them had convinced themselves for too long that they couldn’t have it. That neither of them deserved it. That there was no time and no place to ever just _stop._

She wrapped her arms around her mother, pressing her face into her shoulder. _I can take this moment._


End file.
